MOUNTAIN MAN WHO’S SAVED 2,000 LIVES
He’s plucked stricken climbers and walkers off Ben Nevis and the nearby hills for 50 years. And Terry, 73, is STILL striding to the rescue
AS the oldest member of Scotland’s busiest mountain rescue team, Terry Confield has braved torrential rain and blizzards for 50 years to bring fallen climbers home, dead or alive. For many who venture on to Ben Nevis and its equally treacherous sister peaks, the knowledge that 73-year-old Mr Confield and his fellow guardians are there should anything go wrong gives them the courage to go further than they might have done otherwise.
But therein can lie the problem, with some sallying forth in flip-flops or bare feet, or clad only in shorts in freezing conditions – and the Lochaber Mountain Rescue Team, which celebrates its Golden Jubilee this year, has seen it all.
Yet not all are so foolhardy and this week, with much of Scotland still recovering from the Beast which brought the country to a virtual standstill, it will be business as usual for the team.
Uppermost in their minds is resuming the search for the body of Marcin Bialas, 36, who is believed to have been buried by an avalanche on January 21, close to Observatory Gully.
The team has a proven track record of finding everyone it searches for on the ben, no matter how long it takes, and is determined to reunite Mr Bialas with his loved ones for burial.
‘We do everything we can to bring fallen climbers and hill walkers back home, dead or alive,’ says Mr Confield.
These days the team of men and women can rely on a drone and, if necessary, helicopter back-up to help them in their harrowing task.
But as one of the founding members of the rescue team in 1968, it was once a very different scenario for Mr Confield.
‘We just had our boots, helmet and an ice axe,’ he recalls. ‘We didn’t have 2,000ft ropes or any of the waterproof clothing you see today. If it rained, you got soaked. It was just a joke.’
EVERYTHING he knows, he says, he learned from other, more experienced climbers, adding: ‘I remember the first time someone took me up my first snow gully. We were climbing up this damn-near vertical face with no crampons. We got to the top, scrambled over into a corrie – and that’s when I learned the hard way how to stop myself in a controlled manner if I slipped or fell. By the end of the day, I felt I’d climbed Mount Everest, I was so chuffed.’
Even then, still living at home in Fort William, he had trouble convincing his mother he was doing the right thing, risking life for others. He recalls: ‘We started out as a group of climbers in a local mountaineering club. The local bobby would cycle around on his bike to see if any of us were available to go out on a rescue.
‘After a couple of visits by him to our home, my mother took me aside one day and said: “Terence, I wish you would stop what you’re doing. The neighbours are talking about the police coming to our door all the time!”’
The introduction of pagers removed the need for police visits but it was the mobile phone that transformed operations, allowing the team to get out on Ben Nevis and the vast wilderness surrounding it much sooner.
In some cases, those finding themselves in trouble have even been able to make an SOS call, signal permitting, assisting the team in their efforts.
Now the team hopes to have technology fitted to their drone so it can pinpoint someone in the rough terrain, even when their phone is switched off. Former Forestry Commission mechanical engineer Mr Confield reflects: ‘I can hardly believe what mountain rescue has become – I’ve got no hankering for the olden days.
‘We can now send our drone up the mountainside, looking for signs of clothing or kit and, from its height, it can cover a greater area in a shorter period of time than if we had to go up and down gullies looking for clues ourselves. That’s a big plus.’
In the past month the team has recovered two other hillwalkers who fell to their deaths. Postman Jim Stalker went through a cornice – an overhanging edge of snow – on 3,451ft Beinn a’Chaorainn, near Glen Spean, on February 11.
Christopher Fryer, 38, from Norfolk, was the sixth walker to lose his life on Scotland’s deadly hills this winter. Police said his body was found last Sat-
urday on 3,159ft Sgurr Thuilm, a Munro to the north of Glenfinnan.
Incredibly, all six fatalities have been hillwalkers – at this time of year it is usually climbers attracted by scaling ice formations who are the victims.
‘There’s so much snow this winter that they are putting themselves in a difficult position,’ added Mr Confield. ‘There’s a chance they could easily get caught in an avalanche.’
He had his own lucky escape two years ago when the team were called out to rescue a climber who had fallen through a cornice.
Lowered down repeatedly on to the icy overhang by the team, Mr Confield heard a sickening crack on the third attempt and felt the cornice give way below his feet. Plunging down the slope, he could have become engulfed in the avalanche sparked by his fall, but years of experience kicked in automatically: ‘I remember just seeing the silhouette of the climber we’d been searching for, then suddenly the whole floor and me along with it were sliding down the slope.
‘Thanks to a mic in my pocket I was able to radio the team, telling them where he was and not to let go of the rope they were holding on to me with, while I waited for the avalanche I’d started to stop. When everything came to a halt, I’d slid about 100ft and had to climb back up.
‘But we got the boy off safely. He’d fallen through the cornice and decided to stay there until rescued. There was no other safe way out.’
The team has carried out around 2,500 rescues in total, sometimes climbing Ben Nevis twice in one day, and answers between 80-100 call-outs a year, compared to around 15 when the team was in its infancy. It’s estimated Mr Confield has helped to save over 2,000 people.
HE was awarded an MBE in 2002 and still trains in the gym twice a week, adding: ‘People ask me: “Why do you do mountain rescue”? I say it’s an excuse to go out into the hills. It’s also a challenge. ‘If someone gets themselves lost and we know where they left from, we put ourselves in their position and think about what mistakes they could have made. It’s a process of elimination. There are no heroics about it. No one’s going around saying: “Look at me, I’m a mountain rescuer.” We are just a good bunch of people who love the mountains and like to hang out together.’
But is he ever haunted by any of the incidents he witnessed as part of the team he led for 14 years?
‘If you know you’ve done your best to find someone, and you still can’t, there’s really nothing else you can do,’ he reflects. ‘I still sleep at night and nothing comes back to haunt me.’
But some incidents still rankle. Despite a 100 per cent strike rate on 4,411ft Ben Nevis, the team also covers a large area including troublespots such as Aonach Beag and Aonach Mor – and four or five bodies there were never found.
‘Aonach Beag is a b***h of a hill for missing people,’ says Mr Confield. ‘There’s a great big burn flowing down it through deep lochs and there are large boulders under the water, some the size of saloon cars, which can trap a body.’
Two years ago, a 28-year-old woman came close to perishing on Ben Nevis in shorts and tights. In the summer of 2014, rescuers on Aonach Mor had to carry a man to safety when he slipped and hurt his ankle – while wearing flip-flops.
John Stevenson, the current team leader, remains philosophical about such folly, saying: ‘We still have idiots but not as many as we used to – the message seems to be getting through.’
The summer is the peak time for the 100,000-plus walkers who try to scale Ben Nevis each year, often leading to broken ankles, tumbles and exhaustion call-outs.
One of the bravest rescues was in October two years ago when Fraser Campbell, 52, from Clackmannanshire, plunged 1,300ft to his death from the North Face.
His climbing partner sat in darkness for eight hours on a ledge until rescued in one of the most challenging operations in which the team had taken part.
One of the saddest moments was the recovery of the bodies of Rachel Slater, 24, and Tim Newton, 27, from Bradford, caught by an avalanche on Valentine’s Day.
Mr Stevenson said: ‘We have gone into some horrible places, but I refuse to let the team go where it’s too dangerous. We searched over many weeks before we found Rachel and Tim – that was especially poignant.’
Yet Mr Confield can look back on his 50 years with pride, adding: ‘Being part of the mountain rescue team has brought me so much happiness and contentment. If I had to go through the last 50 years again, I would – good and bad.’
It costs £80,000 a year to run the team. To make a donation, visit www.lochabermrt.co.uk